


Weapon of Choice

by scarlettwriter11



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Abandonment, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Weapons, dean's gun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-28
Updated: 2013-07-28
Packaged: 2017-12-21 16:44:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/902559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarlettwriter11/pseuds/scarlettwriter11
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean Winchester’s engraved, nickel plated Colt 1911 Al .45 caliber semi-automatic with ivory handles was not just a gun; it was a reflection of Dean himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weapon of Choice

You might say that a person’s weapon of choice is a reflection of who they are. For instance, a person who prefers to wield a finely crafted sword might be an honorable fighter, who, like their lone blade, is filled with a wandering spirit and doesn’t much care for the company of others except in desperate times or when metal meets flesh in a satisfying manner. An archer might be a cunning person, filled with varying levels of anger and pain and love and loss, each wave of emotion coming in different strengths and lengths. To carry a knife wherever you go might make you a secretive, quietly vicious person who doesn’t necessarily want to kill, but is quite partial to the fine art of torture when it comes to revenge. 

And then you have those who like the sweet recoil of a gun, the fine smell of gunpowder and metal, the sharp, satisfying ring in the ears after a bullet has met its target. A person who holsters a gun at their side might have been a reckless person in adolescence, but as they grew and fired off more shots than they could control, hurt more people than they saved, they became a lean, finely greased machine, ready to kill, who chose their shots wisely, and never missed. Their words might be loud and quick and full of bang and flare, but in the end always lead to one meaning, always headed to one end. And, depending on how they aimed, could sever life in a single shot, or bleed a person dry, slowly and full of fumbling pain. A gun’s weight is comprised of many things, not just metal and grease, but responsibility, and most importantly, history. Every shot is a moment in time, frozen and preserved within that gun’s barrel. And it’s heavy as all hell, and that history binds gun to man, until it’s no longer discernable where gun starts and man ends. Because they are the same, and they share something deeper than flesh. They share blood. 

Dean Winchester’s engraved, nickel plated Colt 1911 Al .45 caliber semi-automatic with ivory handles was not just a gun; it was a reflection of Dean himself. Sam was going to be nineteen the year he’d seen the piece in a small gun shop in Texas and before he knew it he had spent all of his money and hid the gun away in his bag. Every night, when his father and brother were asleep, Dean would take the gun out and thoroughly clean it, despite its lack of use. Then he’d weigh it in his hands, passing it from one hand to the other, admiring how light yet sturdy the gun was. How it glistened in the dim light of the motel lamps. It was a beautiful gun, one he was sure that Sam would really come to appreciate and love, one that would protect him. And then Sam left. He left before Dean could give him the gun and he didn’t know what to do with it so he kept it hidden in his bag. 

He still cleaned it every night, even though he never used it. And every night when he took it out, he no longer admired it. He hated it. And the thought that maybe, if he had given it to him early, maybe if Sam had found it on his own, he wouldn’t have left them. He wouldn’t have left Dean. 

One night, a few months after Sam had left, while John was at some dive bar down the street drinking away his consciousness, Dean was cleaning the gun and for no other reason but to feel something, Dean placed the gun in his mouth. It wasn’t loaded or anything, Dean wasn’t suicidal like that, but he thought that perhaps the sharp tang of the metal on tongue and the smell of gunpowder in nose would somehow stir something in Dean. It didn’t. 

Almost a year had gone by since Sam had left and Dean had started to carry the gun on hunts and then eventually just on his person wherever he went. He never planned on using it, even though he kept it fully loaded at all times. He just liked having the weight of the piece on him. It didn’t make him feel quite so lonely. Although, he would never admit that to his father, who in return would never ask. They were both hurting, in different ways perhaps, but it was still a hurt that they both felt deep down and didn’t dare share with one another. 

It was when John began letting Dean take care of hunts by himself that he started to use the gun. Sparsely at first, but gradually, as Dean started to grow accustomed to the gun’s reliability and accuracy, it became his weapon of choice. At this point, he knew Sam wasn’t coming back. He knew Sam didn’t want to have anything to do with them or the life they lead and with that knowledge in mind, Dean built up a sort of protective shell around himself and the gun was a very important part of that shell. It was after all, a beautiful and finely crafted weapon, and it distracted Dean and everyone else he encountered from the fact that he ached more terribly than he had in a long time. 

If John noticed that Dean started to use this rather flamboyant gun, he didn’t say anything. He just wanted the job done and done well, and if the gun and his son could do it, then he didn’t care what tools were used. When Dean was twenty-three, two years after Sam had left, he gave Dean the Impala. At that point, John didn’t much resemble a man any longer, but a cold and calculating hunter. There had been a time when he was both, a sad combination of man and hunter, but that time had long since past. Sam might as well have died and so he released his keeper and home and roamed about, searching for the thing that had brought on all of this because, that was all he could do anymore.

Dean and the gun continued their partnership, even after he was reunited with Sam. There was a brief period of time when Dean thought about giving the gun to Sam, but then realized that the time where it could have been Sam’s had passed. It was Dean’s gun now, and it would remain so until the day he died. Sam once inquired about the gun, and Dean who didn’t have the stomach to relay the story to him, lied and told him he’d won it in a bet. Sam knew he was lying, but instead of questioning further, he let it go. And, just like the Impala, the gun became apart of their every day life and it was unique to Dean and Dean alone and Sam appreciated that. He thought of it as a sort of fingerprint to Dean, a unique and vital part of Dean’s identity, something that couldn’t be replicated or bought. It was indisputably and solely, Dean.

**Author's Note:**

> My friend Satyra and I were talking about SPN one day and the topic of Dean's gun came up. We realized that the origins of it had never really been explained, so Satyra told me I should write a little ficlet about it. There is literally zero background on it, so I pretty much had to make it up as I went. It was Satyra's idea to make it an intended gift for Sam which I think really made the story so much richer than I had in mind. So yeah.  
> This is my first SPN "fic". I'm currently working on another, but it's kind of a huge project, so I thought I'd break the ice with this little ficlet to kick of my new ao3 account. So thank you so much for reading! I hoped you enjoyed it. :)


End file.
